The moment Virelya stood beside me, the hall fell into a silence so sharp it could've sliced through bone.
Not one noble dared speak.
Even the Inquisitor faltered for a breath—just one—but I saw it.
He hadn't expected her to protect me.
He'd come to test her restraint.
Instead, he walked into defiance.
"I suggest," Rynald said carefully, "you think very hard about what you're doing, Lady Virelya."
"I have," she replied. "And I'm done pretending this curse is mine alone."
Gasps. Whispers. Magic flickered in the corners of the chamber like nervous sparks.
"You would expose yourself further?" he said, smile tight. "You know what happens if the bond is confirmed."
"I don't need your confirmation," she said. "It's already killing us."
That shut everyone up.
Even me.
I should've stopped her. Pulled her back. Told her to breathe before the world turned on her again.
But all I could do was look at her.
Not like a savior. Not like a villain.
Like someone standing in the middle of a storm with her head held high, even as it tore her apart.
And gods help me—I didn't care if it destroyed everything.
I just didn't want her to stand alone anymore.
The Inquisitor moved toward us.
Slow. Controlled. Like he thought he could reason with a bomb.
"Then by the authority of the Crown, and the laws set by the Six Pillars, you are both hereby—"
The floor cracked.
Right beneath our feet.
A spiderweb fracture of shimmering silver split the stone.
The temperature dropped ten degrees in an instant.
Wind howled through the sealed windows.
Everyone froze.
Even him.
I grabbed Virelya's wrist, but she didn't move.
She was staring at the crack in the floor.
"No," she whispered. "Not here. Not yet."
"What is it?" I asked.
"The bond's reacting," she said. "Too fast. Too much."
And then the sky screamed.
Magic surged—wild, ancient, unbound.
It crashed through the roof of the hall like lightning made of light and memory and wrath.
People scattered, shields snapping up too late.
I pulled Virelya behind a column as energy exploded through the room, tearing into marble and air and reality itself.
Through the chaos, I heard it.
A voice.
No—not a voice.
A truth.
"The bond has awakened.
One shall break.
One shall burn.
The world shall fall if they dare to love."
It wasn't a threat.
It was a prophecy.
Alive.
And it had just been spoken into the bones of the world.
When the magic calmed, the chamber was in ruins.
Debris littered the floor. Light flickered weakly from damaged runes.
The Inquisitor stood hunched, burned at the edge of his robes, rage barely contained.
And us?
We stood in the center—unharmed.
Untouched.
As if the world refused to hurt the very thing it wanted to punish.
Later, they tried to cover it up.
Said it was a magical accident.
A surge from unstable artifacts.
Only a few people knew the truth.
And even fewer would live to speak it.
That night, I found Virelya in the highest tower, standing at the edge of the balcony with wind whipping her hair like silk ribbons caught in a storm.
"Say it again," I told her.
She didn't turn.
"I shouldn't have said it the first time."
"Say it anyway."
Her hand curled into a fist on the railing.
"It doesn't matter now. The bond's awake. The prophecy's been declared. I sealed our fate."
"You didn't," I said, stepping closer. "We did. Together."
She turned finally, eyes shining in the moonlight.
"If we fall in love, the world ends."
"Then we better fall the right way."
She almost laughed.
But it broke before it became sound.
And when she stepped into me, when our foreheads touched again, I realized something terrifying.
It was already too late.
Because I was in love with her.